Thor, Magneto, Equally Dumb Make For An Even Match
The story opens with Thor touring a Hall of Heroes at the New York World's Fair, which includes a statue of him, and the rest of the Avengers, as well as The Fantastic Four. We are told that they also have statures of the X-Men, but they're "in the next room". This is appropriate, because although the X-Men use their powers to affect events in this issue - they are never seen, they're always in the next room, or just off panel.
I have to admit, I was a little wary about this issue, given that the master villain was Magneto, and Stan Lee has demonstrated over and over again, a poor grasp on the concept of magnetism. While I was right to be concerned about that aspect of the story, it was hardly the worst part. You see, Magneto arrives in New York in a corny submarine disguised as a floating tree. Then when Thor goes aboard, the two proceed to battle each other doing stupid things to each other panel after panel. Magneto tears apart his own sub with his powers heedless of the danger, Thor throws his hammer away and then forgets about it - you get the idea.
Meanwhile, Quicksilver, The Scarlet Witch, Toad and Mastermind get into a battle with the unseen X-Men, who they lead back to the sub, where the X-Men save the day, upstaging Thor in his own book, and chase Magneto off, all without ever appearing in a single panel.
Lame.
The issue also does away with the text story - a feature no one is likely to miss - and replace it, wisely, with a letters column.
Finally, the back-up story, part of the Tales of Asgard series, is a decent story about Thor being banished from Asgard and being pursued by an army of Mountain Giants. It does a little to rescue the issue, bringing it up to about mediocre level.
